"Some people say life is the thing, but I prefer reading"
- Logan Pearsall Smith

Sunday, September 18, 2016

Sunday Poetry - Charlotte Brontë

I'm reading Elizabeth Gaskell's Life of Charlotte Brontë - the first edition with all the libelous bits, of course. I've had this copy for about 30 years & I also have a copy of the third edition with the changes Gaskell was forced to make. In Charlotte's Bicentenary year, it felt like the right time to reread the first &, in some ways, the best biography because Gaskell knew Charlotte. I've also recently read Hermione Lee's Biography : a Very Short Introduction which has made me aware all over again of the motives of biographers. Often it's more about the biographer than the subject. That's why I can read several biographies of the same person as all of them emphasize different aspects of the life. Then there are memoirs & autobiographies. John le Carré's memoir, The Pigeon Tunnel, has just been published in the UK & his biographer, Adam Sisman, has just written a very gracious article in the Guardian about the experience of being le Carré's biographer & the difference between memoir & biography. I enjoyed Sisman's biography & I'm looking forward to reading The Pigeon Tunnel.

As this is supposed to be Sunday Poetry, not Sunday Biographical Ramblings, here's one of Charlotte's poems. If thou be in a lonely place,If one hour's calm be thine,As Evening bends her placid faceO'er this sweet day's decline;If all the earth and all the heavenNow look serene to thee,As o'er them shuts the summer even,One moment ­think of me !

Pause, in the lane, returning home;'Tis dusk, it will be still:Pause near the elm, a sacred gloomIts breezeless boughs will fill.Look at that soft and golden light,High in the unclouded sky;Watch the last bird's belated flight,As it flits silent by.

Hark ! for a sound upon the wind,A step, a voice, a sigh;If all be still, then yield thy mind,Unchecked, to memory.If thy love were like mine, how blestThat twilight hour would seem,When, back from the regretted Past,Returned our early dream !

If thy love were like mine, how wildThy longings, even to pain,For sunset soft, and moonlight mild,To bring that hour again !But oft, when in thine arms I lay,I've seen thy dark eyes shine,And deeply felt, their changeful raySpoke other love than mine.

My love is almost anguish now,It beats so strong and true;'Twere rapture, could I deem that thouSuch anguish ever knew.I have been but thy transient flower,Thou wert my god divine;Till, checked by death's congealing power,This heart must throb for thine.